


miss you, indefinite

by sundermount



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Established Relationship, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-26
Updated: 2020-12-26
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:41:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,912
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27993933
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sundermount/pseuds/sundermount
Summary: Felix and Dimitri pay a visit to Rodrigue.
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/Felix Hugo Fraldarius
Comments: 9
Kudos: 45
Collections: 2020 Dimilix Exchange





	miss you, indefinite

**Author's Note:**

  * For [adamantine](https://archiveofourown.org/users/adamantine/gifts).



> Happy holidays, Victoria! I loved your prompt about established dmlx visiting Rodrigue's grave, and I hope I've done it justice.

"Is this the place?" Dimitri asks. A meaningless and rhetorical question, meant for the purpose of filling the silence. The peaceful calm and quiet is interrupted only by the whistle of wind in their ears, and the rustle of grass underfoot.

The first time Dimitri had visited the Fraldarius burial grounds, he was fourteen, and accompanied by a grim-faced Rodrigue and an even grimmer Felix. It was raining, and his silence had lasted the entire day. His words would not have made themselves known over the sound of rain, in any case.

His next visit had been three years ago, clad in mourning garb, surrounded by his and Felix's friends and distant members of the Fraldarius family. Dimitri had hung back, awkward and unsure of his place as Felix and his uncle led the party. They had not been walking for long before Felix turned back, strode over to him and led him to the front to be by his side.

It was the fall after the war, and they were still feeling out a tentative friendship. The touch of his hand—a stranger then, an intimate, familiar friend now—had been a brand around Dimitri's wrist.

Presently, it is just the both of them, still as they survey the horizon. The winds are much stronger today, and Dimitri watches as Felix’s hair fights a losing battle and a rogue strand escapes from his tie. He almost reaches out to fix it for him, but—

“I still think it’s ridiculous,” Felix says, the lines under his eyes deepening as he squints up against the glare of the sun.

“Okay,” Dimitri says, as pleasant as he can, turning away from him and setting out in the approximate direction of where they are headed. He ignores Felix’s squawk of protest, and his lips curve up into a smile when Felix overtakes him a few moments later.

Thank the Goddess. He really does not know which direction they should be heading towards. Ask him to find his way to the Fraldarius homestead with nothing but his wits, and he can be there in three days. Finding his way _here_ , however. Any skill in navigation lost to the wind, his fate in the hands of his Felix, who he trusts to nudge him to where he needs to be.

Dimitri immediately presses his smile back into a firm line, lest he turns back. He enjoys Felix’s put-upon displeasure, but inciting it on purpose too often would not be the wisest choice if he does not want him to catch on.

His headstrong and steadfast Felix does not turn back, in any case, stalking determinedly towards their intended destination. His boots, freshly-cleaned, are dirtied again; half-sinking into the ground still muddied from the previous day’s rain.

Dimitri takes his time to indulge, walking slower, mindful of his own boots and where he steps. He breathes in the air, colder and sharper here than in Fhirdiad, as he lets himself be mesmerised by the swish of Felix’s cloak and the sway of his hair.

“Keep up, boar.” Felix turns around from where he waits ahead. “Don’t forget that this was your idea.”

Dimitri basks in his annoyed, subtly affectionate gaze as he takes in the sight of him. Straight-backed, chin tilted upward as he sniffs pronouncedly, his self-satisfaction evident even from a distance. Dimitri slows his stride on purpose even as he lengthens it, and Felix’s forehead predictably wrinkles in annoyance.

“I am far from slow. I know you know it well.” Dimitri smiles, the one he knows will make Felix blink fast to clear his vision before he ducks his head to avoid Dimitri’s gaze. “You are the one who is dazzlingly fast when you wish to be. You are unparalleled in speed, the same way you are with everything you choose to excel in.”

“Shut up,” Felix says, and he—as Dimitri had predicted—ducks his head. He turns, whip-fast, gracing Dimitri with the back of it before marching forward at a faster pace. Dimitri manages to catch Felix's blush in time; the faintest hint of pink creeping up his face, obvious on his winter-paled skin.

His affection pools in his heart, warm and thick and syrupy-slow. This time, he does nothing to stop his own smile.

Felix continues ahead of him as they make the way to their intended destination, stone and marble mounds swelling in size as they draw closer. He leads Dimitri down a slightly overgrown path, past rows of ancestors and extended family; and before Dimitri knows it, they are back where Rodrigue is buried.

His grave differs from the rest in the grounds, inscribed stone laid flat instead of carved and upright. It was the best Felix could manage, with a lack of resources and adequately skilled stone carvers.

 _Rodrigue Achille Fraldarius_  
_Shield to the Crown_  
_Warrior, father, healer, brother_  
_1135 - 1186_

The inscription is a simple one. Felix is not a person one would make the mistake of ascribing sentimentality to.

“Dad,” Felix says, and they lapse into silence.

“Er,” Dimitri says, for lack of anything else. He should have planned what to say, in hindsight. “Rodrigue, sir.” He clears his throat and straightens to his full height, his back rigid. “We have come to pay our re—”

“We’re getting married,” Felix interrupts. He turns back to Dimitri. “There. That’s done. Can we go now?”

Irritation wells up in Dimitri, and he turns towards Felix, wearing it clear on his face. Felix had promised it would be _fine_ , and insisted on accompanying Dimitri in doing whatever he wished, when Dimitri shared his reasons for wanting to visit. “You _promised_ , Felix,” he says, his upset and mild betrayal clear in his tone.

Felix would snap back, if it was anything else. But Dimitri knows he knows he is in the wrong, and he watches as Felix swallows his words and bites at the inner part of his cheek. His expression is suitably chastised. “Fine.” He shuffles closer to Dimitri and brushes the backs of their hands together. _I’m sorry_.

“We have come to pay our respects,” Dimitri continues. He raises a finger to flick over the curve of Felix’s cheekbone, as if dusting an eyelash away. _It’s okay, my love_. “And we would like to inform you that I have asked for Felix’s hand in marriage, and he has said yes.”

“Oh, for the love of Seiros—“ Felix mutters.

“I am finally making an honest man out of him, as per his wish,” Dimitri says, teasing. A bit of petty revenge he is allowing himself, for Felix's actions.

“Please, say it louder for every Fraldarius here.” Felix glares at him as his arm swings out, gesticulating.

“Do you want me to?” Dimitri grins, breath already filling his own chest as he readies his shout. His grin grows wider at Felix’s panicked, wide-eyed glare; then even wider under Felix’s gloved hand, when he presses it over his mouth.

“Don’t. You. Dare,” he hisses, each word enunciated through clenched teeth. He is _enthrallingly_ beautiful, entrancing in his anger, and Dimitri is again reminded of why he likes to rile him up as much as he does.

Dimitri takes hold of his wrist, circling it with his thumb and forefinger. He guides it away, then back; pressing a kiss over where Felix wears his ring.

Felix splutters, indignance clear in the crease of his brow as Dimitri reaches out to tug the flap of his cloak closer together, a flimsy excuse to touch. The snow-white fur of the sable Dimitri trapped and killed during the hunt that marked the beginning of their engagement lies thick and warm around his neck, above layered fabric in a rich teal.

The cloak is the second of Dimitri’s courting gifts. The first was a sword, which required the least effort on Dimitri's part when thinking of what would be the most appropriate and fitting symbol of his affections; the same as it is with any situation that requires "Felix" and "gift" to be used in the same sentence. He does not fancy himself a terribly inventive man, and it is a significant relief that Felix is as easy to please as he is.

“Does he not look extremely dashing, Rodrigue?” Dimitri asks.

A grunt rings out, echoing in the wind. Dimitri grins. Goddess forgive him for taking as much pleasure as he does in annoying his love, but Felix makes it too easy. A bit like taking candy from a child, if the child in question was Felix in his youth and had been told the candy was for Dimitri.

Felix bends to place the flowers he’d brought with him on the grave, irritated but clearly trying to fight the expression of pleased satisfaction he only allows himself to wear when he does not think anyone is looking.

It is so impossibly charming Dimitri cannot help but lean over to kiss him on his cheek when he straightens. Felix fails in suppressing it then, and Dimitri watches as it grows on his face, taking shape and form like sword from billet under the firm hand of a skilled smith. 

Felix looks at Dimitri, biting away at the half-smile still on his lips. He flicks at, then brushes the back of his hand over Dimitri’s cheek. The leather is soft and its scent heavy as it rasps across his skin in an affectionate arc.

“You can visit Glenn and your mother by yourself if you want,” Dimitri says, his voice soft.

Felix’s hand stills.

“I will be fine." He smiles in a way he hopes is reassuring. "And they are fairly near, are they not?”

His hand drops, and Dimitri abruptly, impossibly, misses him already. “Are you sure?”

Dimitri’s reply is immediate. “As sure as I am of my fondness for you.”

Felix’s scoff is more reflex than genuine reaction. “If you say so.” He hesitates, then a thumb brushes over the curve of Dimitri’s jaw, as if to reassure himself. “Shout, and I’ll be quick to return to your side.”

“You always are.” Dimitri's gaze remains on Felix as he steps away. He feels a bit silly with how he aches, like the maidens in stories do for their valiant knights.

It is not an unfamiliar sight, but his breath catches all the same at Felix’s profile when he turns to look at Dimitri before he leaves, then at the sway of his cape and hair in the wind.

He turns back to Rodrigue, feeling slightly unsure now that it is only him.

“It’s a nice cloak, isn’t it?” he says awkwardly. “I had a passing thought to make it in my colours, but I think Felix would have a fit and accuse me of, uh, being possessive. It would have been best to avoid that situation altogether.”

He laughs hesitantly, pointer finger tapping fast against the side of his thigh as he breathes in deep, then exhales noisily. He leaves out the part about how the fur of his prize would mark his promised well enough—Rodrigue does not need to know that much. 

Regarding the matter of possessiveness—Dimitri has a long, thought-out plan to ease Felix into a wardrobe partly of his own choosing, but that is still in its earliest stages. Felix Fraldarius is a horse that will not drink if led to water, even if he was on the brink of collapsing of thirst. 

Dimitri says as much to Rodrigue. “He’s always been a bit stubborn, hasn’t he? Not that I do not find it charming, but it is different when I used to be the one he was stubborn about.”

He thinks on a few memories from their childhood with particular fondness; Felix determinedly refusing to eat without Dimitri, the way he would sneak into Dimitri’s room and his bed after hours. How he would chase after the horse-drawn carriage Dimitri and Patricia rode off in just so he could yell _goodbye, Dimitri!_ as much as he wanted while Rodrigue reprimanded him from afar and Glenn laughed; their voices clear over the clip of hooves on ground and rattling wheels over stone.

Dimitri allows himself to imagine Rodrigue’s reply—his laugh, the way he will clap Dimitri on his shoulder and arm when he would have held a respectable distance before. _It is an honour that I can treat you with the familiarity you deserve, Dimitri. Especially since you are to be family_ , he’d have said. Except Dimitri does not actually know, because he is no longer of this world.

He swallows against the guilt building up in his throat, moving to lay his own flowers atop Felix’s and sitting down. The damp of ground is immediately apparent through his breeches, although not too uncomfortable; he can already see Dedue in his mind’s eye, quietly disapproving of the grass stains.

“I apologise for springing this sort of informality upon you” Dimitri says. “But we are to be family soon, and that will hopefully negate any sort of apprehension on your part.”

The tight, wracked feeling in his chest eases a bit, and he pauses to think. What would Rodrigue like to hear about—maybe an update on state matters? That would be of interest to him. “The Kingdom is doing well. We’ve met with friction in our discussions about introducing a new form of government—something that involves the people and their voices, instead of leaving all decisions to myself and the lords, when we do not know the full extent of the problems they face,” he says. ”Majority of the former Alliance nobles have been fairly receptive, and Duke Aegir has also emerged as one of my most vocal supporters.”

He arranges the flowers in a more pleasing formation atop the stone, something for his hands to do as he babbles. “I mentioned to you the first time we visited that Claude gave me the Alliance. It came as quite a shock, but I think I am managing it rather well now. I have good counsel and the help of my friends and other allies. The Archbishop is a great help as well, with the influence that they wield over the church. I would not have been able to accomplish all that I had without them.”

“Not to mention Felix.” He smiles, his giddiness rushing through him. “You will find that he has surpassed all expectations in his position as advisor, although I expected no less. It is one of the things I find most attractive about him.”

His smile grows giddier as he thinks about Felix, and what is to come; a promise ceremony, the chance to call him his own for the rest of their days. “He is an intimidating force. I am the luckiest man in the world that he has chosen myself, of everyone he could have his pick of, to lend his support to and share his life with.”

Speaking to grass and soil and marble is a bit strange, but Dimitri has spoken to much unkinder things in his life. Something without the motivation and wherewithal to lambaste him for his choices is much preferable.

“Do you remember,” Dimitri muses, still stuck on the memory of the Felix of their childhood, “when Felix said that he would marry me?”

He recalls it with some clarity: Rodrigue had sat him down during his visit to Fraldarius in his eighth summer, his expression serious. “When you are of a certain age, you will probably find in yourself a desire to marry,” he’d said.

“But what if I don’t want to marry anyone?” Dimitri had asked, bluntly inquisitive in the manner common of children his age.

Rodrigue hesitated, almost at a loss for words. “Then it is your choice to make,” he’d replied. The end of the sentence had curved up, like it was a question.

“I’ll marry you.” Felix turned to him, his declaration firm, a serious expression on his face. Dimitri resisted the urge to poke at a pudgy cheek the way Glenn always did.

“Er,” Dimitri said, unsure and confused. He had not realised he needed to plan for one so soon. “I don’t even know if I want to get married.”

“I’ll marry you if you choose to get married, then.” Felix nodded, then turned back to the twisted knot of the metal puzzle Glenn gifted him earlier that week.

Rodrigue looked at him in mild confusion. “Did you not just say yesterday that you were averse to marriage?”

“Yeah, but it’s Dimitri.” Felix’s focus remained on the puzzle in his hands. “Dimitri’s my best friend. I’ll say yes if he asks me to.”

Dimitri heaves a put-upon sigh at the memory.

“Felix lied,” he informs Rodrigue. “He took off for Fraldarius the first time I attempted to propose, and I had to chase after him and promise not to make any more sudden and overt displays of affection before he would say yes. Granted, it was not well thought-out on my part, and more of a slip of the tongue than planned action, but I do not think that necessitated fleeing the capital.”

The memory brings to mind another—of one of Rodrigue’s many visits to him in the cathedral, from the afternoon to the evenings before Felix would replace him. Two Fraldariuses sharing a duty, serving for entirely different reasons altogether.

“I wonder if Felix will ever consider taking a wife,” Rodrigue had said contemplatively. “He seems to get along fine with most of his female classmates, although his temper is just as bad as Glenn’s was—I hope it will be different with his future spouse, although I do not hold out much hope.”

“You were right about Felix. His temper remains foul," Dimitri says, fond. His hands are folded in his lap, and he removes his glove to look at and run a thumb over the ring Felix had bestowed upon him as an alleged part of his endowment. Dedue had hinted that Felix's trips out of the castle were visits to a smith that specialised in jewelry; Dimitri had also caught him sneaking a daisy away, the very same one that a war orphan at the royal orphanage had wrapped the stem of around his finger.

Dimitri pulls his glove back on. "But I have found that it is rather adorable when you feign ignorance, and he forgets about it to huff about being ignored. And I am not as kind as I can be, nor will I seek to suffer his moods.”

“Are you speaking ill of me to my own father? And what are you doing on the ground?” Felix barks, his voice in the distance growing louder with the squelch of boots in mud. An absurd relief washes over Dimitri at the sight of him, and he smiles at Felix as he approaches.

“It seems like Felix is back,” Dimitri says, gaze still locked on Felix's face, his eyes narrowed and forehead creased again, “so we must cut our conversation short.”

“You can just continue.” Felix lowers himself to Dimitri’s left, sitting on the ground with nary a care for the state of his breeches. The wind blows his hair Dimitri’s way, teasing and tickling across Dimitri’s mouth in a caress; the scent of his hair oil heavy on the sharp, biting scent of the post-rain wind.

His cloak is arranged so it does not touch the ground. Dimitri turns back to Rodrigue as warmth rushes into his cheeks. Felix leans forward, elbows resting on his knees, his right close enough to brush Dimitri’s leg.

“I was just reminiscing about our childhood,” Dimitri says. He prefers it when Felix remains on his left, which he rarely does when they are in Fhirdiad; it means that Dimitri does not have to turn far to see him when he wants to, which is often.

He likes to joke that marrying Felix is an indulgence on his own part, so he can be free to look his fill. Although his words are always met with confusion, and many a furrowed brow; is it Dimitri himself who is not delivering his joke with the right sort of verve? He will seek his friends' opinions when they are back in the capital.

Felix snorts as he battles the stray strand of hair that’d made its escape earlier out of his face, interrupting Dimitri's thoughts. “Were you?”

“It was about how you were incredibly attached to me, and that time we were eight, when you declared you would marry me,” Dimitri reaches out to tuck his hair behind his ear, then leans forward to kiss him on the cheek. “Thank you for returning to me, my Felix.”

“I—F—Where else would I go?” he splutters, his pinking ears belying his true feelings and lending an even more fetching air to him. He tips his shoulder into Dimitri, nudging him away. “Are you done?” he asks.

“I’ll give you some time to yourself,” Dimitri says, standing and dusting his breeches of grass as much as he can. Saints, they're much damper than he'd expected. He must have been sitting for quite a while.

“I wasn’t asking to be alone. You can stay, you know.” Felix reaches up, holding Dimitri’s hand as he remains on the ground. He squeezes it, and Dimitri’s heart twists.

Felix will never know this, but the way he has chipped away at the wall of himself, brick by brick, to provision for an entrance that is exactly Dimitri-shaped scares him so much, sometimes. He still does not feel worthy of his devotion, even as he holds firm in the belief that he will trust in whatever Felix chooses. And he is what Felix has chosen.

“I wish to pay my respects to Glenn and your mother,” he says, regret clear in his voice. “But I will return to you after.”

He squeezes Felix’s hand once, then presses a kiss to the crown of his head before he walks away.

He journeys down the neat lines of stone, keeping an eye out for familiar names. If he strains his ears, he thinks he can hear the cadence of a bitten-off sentence, followed by a frustrated sound.

Dimitri circles back after placing flowers on both graves, not lingering. Rodrigue is Rodrigue, but Glenn—he still inspires a certain apprehension and fear in him that he will one day hear and fall to the silkened beckoning of spectres again.

“So. Yeah. There’s that.” He hears Felix say, when he is close enough. He is standing as he looks down at the grave, his voice thick in his throat.

“Felix,” he calls. An announcement of his arrival, giving Felix time to compose himself if he wished. But his beloved—even more beloved now, in all his vulnerability—turns to him immediately.

“Boar,” he says, hand extended in Dimitri’s direction.

Dimitri speeds up, walking as fast as he can. Helpless to resist, not that the thought would have even crossed his mind. He is by Felix’s side soon enough; hovering over him and looming tall, as if he is capable of shielding Felix from his own sorrow by virtue of his size.

Felix reaches up to touch the side of Dimitri’s face, the points of three fingers firm against his cheek. Dimitri leans into the touch, turning his head into it to press a kiss to Felix’s palm. He reaches up with both hands to hold it against his face.

“I know what some people think,” Felix says, after a moment. “That I didn’t like him, and that I actively resented him.”

Dimitri had tried to broach the topic about Rodrigue before, but it was always difficult; receiving bitten-off sentences and frustrated sounds in turn, as if the words never quite wanted to leave Felix.

He tries his best to imbue encouragement into his silence, his thumb rubbing slow circles on the back of Felix’s hand still held against his cheek. Dimitri’s want to embrace him is almost overwhelming.

“I—he—we tried. He speaks to my uncle, but in the end—” Felix pauses before continuing, his choke only barely disguised, “it was only the two of us. It hurt more not speaking to him than it was to be angry.”

“You loved him, in your way,” Dimitri says. “As he did you. It is neither of your faults that your ways of loving were incompatible.”

Felix’s voice is small, reminiscent of the child he was, who wore his heart on his sleeve. “I thought about it once. The things I would change if I ever found myself back in that time. Which is ridiculous, because there is no point in looking back on the past.”

Dimitri gives in to the urge to pull Felix into him, immediately pressing his nose to his temple. “Would it even work, considering your stubbornness?”

His _hmph_ is a concession. “You’re right. I would have tried to stop the old man from going to Gronder, to prevent his death as best as I could instead of… doing and saying what I want to now, when there is no longer the chance to.”

They stay as they are for a while, breathing slowly. Taking in the smell of dampened earth and grass and each other. Dimitri sniffs at Felix’s hair until he finds the spot where his scent lingers the strongest, inhaling deep once and pressing his nose and mouth to it.

“Rodrigue brought me back to where I needed to be.” Dimitri’s own words are slow and halting. His voice is steady, anguish he tries to prevent from flooding over—he has done his share of grieving, and he still feels like he does not have the right to, sometimes. Rodrigue is not his father, as much as he had tried to be a guiding hand for Dimitri himself. “I cannot say I am thankful for his death, but it brought me here all the same.”

Felix looks him in the eye as his hand reaches for Dimitri’s, his thumb rubbing over gloved knuckles; over the jewel of Dimitri's ring.

Dimitri holds on tight to it. Felix’s breath comes in a sharp huff.

“This is why I don’t believe in useless what-ifs.” He looks up at Dimitri, eyes intense with a sudden, roiling anger. “Would I have given Glenn or my father for you if presented with the chance? Would I have never had you at all, if that was the cost? What if you both survived Gronder, and—" he pauses to swallow. His next words come out of him rough, scraped from his throat. "I still don’t know if my father would have preferred a living disappointment or a hero he could mourn.”

Dimitri sighs, fitting his chin above Felix’s head. “He wanted him alive, Felix. No parent wants to see their child pass before them.”

“I _know_.” Felix does not shout, but his anger is palpable, his body held tense under Dimitri's hands. “What was he thinking? Why would anyone pacify a child by telling them that their brother’s death was a good and noble thing?”

His voice is muffled against Dimitri’s neck, his hands cupping Dimitri’s elbows. “We were almost… We were at a point where I think things were better. Not truly fine, that could never happen, and I think we both made our peace with that. But better.”

“I know,” Dimitri says. “He tried speaking to me of how you wrote to him more frequently after the war, when you were out looking for me. He said you were less cold than you were, when the both of you worked together against Cornelia.”

”Ugh,” Felix snorts, and it sounds more damp than it usually does. “That sentimental old man.”

He extricates his head from under Dimitri’s chin to look at him, and Dimitri cannot help but smile and brush the escaped-again, still-stray strand of hair out of his eyes.

“What do you mean, tried?” Felix asks. 

“I was not exactly the best conversation partner when we reunited, if you recall.” Dimitri stops to think, before he continues. He hugs Felix even closer to him. “Maybe it was why he spoke to me, out of everyone. I think he was excited to share something about his relationship with you, and he knew you would not appreciate just anyone knowing of your _hidden depths_ , as he put it.”

“Except you, it seems.” Felix bats at Dimitri’s arm impatiently, demanding, and he lowers it to his waist as Felix glowers.

“Was he wrong?” Dimitri asks, smiling. Felix presses two fingers to Dimitri’s philtrum by way of reply, pushing his top lip down to cover teeth and flatten his smile. 

Dimitri kisses the tips of them in retaliation, before grasping Felix’s hand in his own and kissing his knuckles.

Felix glances over at where Rodrigue lays. “Have you said all you wanted to?” he asks Dimitri. His voice is not as sharp, and he makes no move to pull his hand from Dimitri's.

“Yes,” Dimitri says. “What about yourself?”

“Yes.” Felix nods. “Back to my uncle’s place, then. Then home.”

 _Home_. A castle where they both reside, where they will be married in, which will soon be home to more stray animals than Felix can pretend he has no patience for. Where they will, if the situation permits, raise a child or two in the far-off future.

“Then home.” Dimitri rests his fingertips on Felix’s back, and they slowly make their way back, walking in step.

**Author's Note:**

> [curse god for my regret / i miss you, indefinite](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=whl_r4sq9fA)


End file.
